Smoke signals in the ether
The river of information that flows across the Net makes a ripe target for critics of the signal-to-noise ratio, but when it comes to getting a real-time, if fractured, picture of a sprawling disaster, online is the place to go. That’s proving true again as wildfires turn parts of Southern California into little pockets of hell. As has become customary, an instant Wikipedia page was tossed up to collect and present an updated overview of the story, but Flickr has photos, YouTube has video, Google has maps, and assorted blogs, both individual and mainstream media, are full of micro-details.
Retired editor and mobile computing expert Jim Forbes, who is among the refugees, reports that his shelter had full WiFi service. “Lots of people brought notebooks when they left their home, so there was a whole lot of IM traffic in and out of the shelter,” he writes. “The local cell networks were subsumed by traffic early in the day so people were texting friends and loved ones a lot.”
Yeah, great & all. But let’s not forget the gray old MSM. In my case, it was the NYTimes blog that assembled stories, including the LATimes’ summary that built upon Google Maps.